The Exploration of Tibesti, Erdi, Borkou
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The Exploration of Tibesti, Erdi, Borkou, and Ennedi in 1912-1917: A Mission Entrusted to the Author by the French Institute Author(s): Jean Tilho Source: The Geographical Journal, Vol. 56, No. 2 (Aug., 1920), pp. 81-99 Published by: geographicalj Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1781270 Accessed: 27-06-2016 09:57 UTC Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://about.jstor.org/terms JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers), Wiley are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Geographical Journal This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 09:57:26 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms The Geographical Journal Vol. LVI No. 2 August I920 THE EXPLORATION OF TIBESTI, ERDI, BORKOU, AND ENNEDI IN 1912-I917: A Mission entrusted to the Author by the French Institute Lieut.-Colonel Jean Tilho, Gold Medallist of the R.G.S. I9I9 Read at the Meeting of the Society, 19 yanuary I920. Map following p. I60. [Note: The names in the text are spelled in accordance with the mantscript of Colonel Tilho, a few of the principal names-as Chad-in their English form, bZut the greater number in the French transliteration of Arabic. On the accompanying map the names are transliterated according to the G.S.G.S. rules for transposing from the French to the British system. The retention of the 'French spelling in the text has the double advantage of familiarizing the student rwith the two systems, and of preserving in some degree the character of the lecture, which was delivered in French.-ED. G.y.] I. Object of the Mission. EFORE I begin my lecture, allow me to express once more, in your presence, my heartfelt gratitude to the Council of the Royal Geographical Society for the high recompense accorded me on the occa- sion of my last journey in Central Africa. It is of this journey, its chief incidents, and most important results, that I am about to have the honour of giving some account. Let me first of all explain to you, in a few words, what, from a geographical point of view, was the object of my expedition. Explorations in Central Africa, made during the second half of the nineteenth century and in the beginning of the twentieth, had left unsolved a very interesting problem: it had been noticed that the level of vast stretches of desert, several hundred miles north-east of Lake Chad, were considerably lower than that of the lake-the difference amounting in some places to 260 feet; besides this, a wide continuous trench, offering the appearance of an old valley-the Bahr El Ghazal--led from the lake to this low-lying ground, and seemed to stretch far away to the north-east, between the mountain groups of Tibesti and Ennedi. On proceeding towards the north-east, an increasing analogy is to be noticed between G This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 09:57:26 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms 82 THE EXPLORATION OF TIBESTI, ERDI, BORKOU, the malacological fauna of the Chad basin and that of the Nile. Besides which there had been found recently, in the waters of the Chad, a shrimp till then only found in the Nile basin-the PaZoemon Ni'oticus, Roux. In short, all these signs appeared to confirm the supposition that the basin of the Chad was not a closed basin, but belonged to that of the Nile, and was a former affluent of the old river on whose banks had sprung up and flourished one of the most brilliant and ancient civilizations of the world. This was the hypothesis that the French Institute wished to have investigated, and in the early part of I9I2 I had the honour to be chosen to undertake the necessary researches. May I tell you how the mission thus entrusted to me fulfilled my dearest wish ? From my early youth I had felt myself irresistibly drawn towards Africa, and I was filled with a desire to take a modest share in the discoveries of great explorers, whose intrepid expeditions had revealed to the civilized world some part of the mysterious and immense dark continent. You doubtless remember how vague, some thirty years ago, was our knowledge of that part of the world. At that time-which now seems so far away even for those then living--I had for chaplain at the grammar- school a holy man who was an ardent patriot; in his Sunday sermons he used to talk to us a little of our duty to God, and still more of our duty to our humiliated country, which was waiting and meditating, as it laboured, on the possible reparation of the iniquities of I87I. His voice, sad at first while he spoke of our disasters and the sufferings of our lost provinces, soon grew eager and thrilled as he showed us the new way to be taken by children, as we then were, to raise the prestige of our flag: he would speak to us of that mysterious Africa, half revealed by Living- stone, Stanley, and Savorgnan de Brazza; and I fancy, after these thirty years, I still hear the sound of the name of Savargnan de Brazza re- echoing through our humble chapel and thrilling like a bugle-call. Then, of an evening in the class-room, I would ponder over the map of Africa, where amid great blank spaces appeared in the centre of the continent a few geographical features, one of which, coloured in blue, Lake Chad, possessed a singular fascination for me. Some years later, on leaving Saint-Cyr, I began to look forward to the realizing of my dream: after a first campaign in Madagascar, I was sent out to serve on the banks of the Niger in I899; and since that date each successive campaign in Africa allowed me to push a little further eastwards, and so get to work on a fresh item of the programme I had set myself to carry out: to establish an accurate geographical liaison between the basins of the Niger, the Chad, and the Nile, and unite by a great transversal line the extreme ends of the routes followed by Nachtigal to Tibesti, Borkou, Wadai and Dar Four. In I9I2 I was ordered to take command of the province of Kanem for the purpose of preparing a projected expedition against Borkou, This content downloaded from 131.247.112.3 on Mon, 27 Jun 2016 09:57:26 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms AND ENNEDI IN I912-I9I7 83 where the Senoussists had established their chief centre of agitation and anti-French propaganda, and whence they periodically sent out plundering expeditions, which spread ruin and desolation among the peaceful tribes placed under our protection. About the same time, the Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres entrusted me with the mission I mentioned above, concerning the supposed connection between the basins of the Chad and of the Nile. Of this latter expedition, which lasted five years -I9I2-I917-- I now propose to give you a resume. 2. From Congo to Borkou. From Congo to Lake Chad. -I do not think there would be any real interest in a detailed account of my journey to Kanem; I followed a route pretty well known, the Congo-Ubangi-Shari route. We left the steamer at Matadi, at the foot of the cataracts, and took the Belgian railway which leads to Kinshassa on Stanley Pool, at the head of the cataracts; from there, after crossing the Congo to land at Brazzaville, we proceeded on a river-steamer, first up the Congo itself, and then up its tributary the Ubangi, as far as Bangui. Farther up, lighter steamers enabled us to surmount the rapids and reach Fort De Possel, a little post built on the right bank at the point where the Ubangi changes its course. From Fort De Possel we went by land to Fort Crampel, covering nearly I60 miles of the zone which divides the waters between the basins of the Congo and the Chad. A fine road for motor-cars was being completed when I passed, but the only means of transport was carriers on foot. At Fort Crampel we embarked in small boats and descended the Gribingui till it falls into the Bahr-Sara, taking farther down the name of Shari; from thence we proceeded on a river-steamer up the Shari till we reached the Chad, and crossed over to the post of Bol, on the northern shore of the lake; and finally, in four more stages, we reached by land the town of Mao, the military and political centre of Kanem. This journey, which takes about twelve or fourteen weeks, according to the season, is very interesting for travellers, and especially for sports- men, who find opportunity for exercising their skill on game of all sizes, from the elephant and the lion to the modest guinea-fowl. I may mention that when I passed by the banks of the Shari, the remembrance of the exciting hunts of the celebrated aviator Latham, killed by a buffalo, was still fresh in every one's mind; but does any one remember Latham now ? We should notice that this line is still far from comfortable, and that the ever-present danger of catching the sleeping sickness through the myriads of glossina-flies that may sting the traveller, spoils all the pleasure one would feel in beholding the splendid landscapes of tropical rivers flowing beneath the shady arches of the quiet forests.